Depression impacts heart health, with women facing a particularly elevated risk of cardiovascular disease compared to men, a new study has revealed.
According to the study published in the JACC journal, having a previous diagnosis of depression raised the risk for heart disease by 39 percent in men, while the risk was 64 percent in women. The researchers hope their findings will provide insight into the need for tailoring cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention and management strategies according to sex-specific factors.
“The identification of sex-specific factors in the adverse effects of depression on cardiovascular outcomes may help in the development of targeted prevention and treatment strategies that address the specific CVD risks faced by depressed patients. A better understanding will allow healthcare providers to optimize care for both men and women with depression, leading to improved CVD outcomes for these populations,” said Hidehiro Kaneko, a corresponding author of the study.
Earlier studies have established the link between depression and elevated risk of cardiovascular events such as heart attacks, angina, strokes, and death. Although women with depression were found to be at a higher relative risk of experiencing adverse heart-related health outcomes compared to men, there is no sufficient evidence regarding the impact based on sex differences, and the underlying mechanisms behind this phenomenon are not thoroughly understood.
To examine the association between depression and subsequent CVD events, researchers conducted an observational cohort study involving 4,125,720 participants who were part of a Japanese insurance claims database. The participants had a median age of 44 and around 57 percent of them were men.
The study identified people with depression as those clinically diagnosed before their initial health checkup. The participant’s body mass index (BMI), blood pressure, and fasting laboratory values were also collected at the checkup. The…
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